Top 10 PC RPG Games

For me, a good PC RPG has several criteria it must live up to. The first is that it must feature nice character customization, so that you can experience some degree of freedom in creating your character. Story is also important, but the ability to behave differently with each character is a more compelling reason for me. I like to do things good or bad, and most of the games here offer some degree of flexibility with morals. I also like to distrubute points when I level, so that I can always look forward to having complete control over what I get better at on the next level. Simple RPGs where you gain a level, and have a fixed number of stat points distrubuted to your skills are outdated, I prefer to have control. If I want this style of play, I could go to the console. I expect more from the PC.

At any rate, here are my personal top 10 PC RPGs, from my years of gaming. Everyone's top 10 would differ, so I could say these are my ten favorite, rather than a flat top 10. I haven't played all the PC Rpgs so I can't say I know them all. There are several I would add if I could, but I haven't played them enough, and this does include Morrowind. My PC at the time couldn't handle it so I never experienced it during its glory days.

10. Freedom Force

Freedom force was an awesome rpg! It could do better on this top 10, but the story was linear. You had the ability to make a custom superhero to fight injustice in the city. The game didn't have a lot of replay value from the onset, but when you consider that you can go through the game with different squads of heroes, and experience different strategic opportunities in the quests, it earns its merits. The graphics were nice, granting it a cartoony-comic book look. The damage messages and all looked like they were taken from the pages of Batman Comics. You could choose how to distribute the points your heroes earned during a particular quest, giving the customization options I love.

9. Knights of the Old Republic & KOTOR 2 Sith Lords

Bioware, when will you ever stop impressing me with your flood of awesome Role Playing Games. This game I've only played recently, but am totally into the customization and class selection. You can be any of several classes, featuring different jedi types. The story in both was incredible, and you can play through with either a light side jedi or a dark side sith. Both change the story significantly, and your class choice will have a large impact on play. The game is very quest-driven, but the quests are fun and you level up fairly quickly. This game is good for at least three playthroughs, and the campaign can be from 30-50 hours. For most people, this would be a top 10 pc rpg.

8. Space Rangers 2: Rise of the Dominators

Some people might ask me if this is even an RPG, but I'd have to definitely say yes. It's a bit of a mixed bag as far as games go with space combat, trading commodities, gaining levels and upgrading your character and ship. There are a huge number of ships in Space Rangers 2, and you can customize your pilot's skills while you pursue the war with the dominators. It's an entirely open-ended game with no real story save the lackluster gig with the dominators. It's fun to create a character, and get powerful enough to take on those computer-driven monstrosities though, so this game fits just fine on my top 10.

7. The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

I was lagging behind the newest generation of PC games, so I bought a Geforce 8800. I'm not much into first person RPGs, but with this purchase, I snagged a copy of Oblivion while I was shopping. I knew this game would impress me visually, and show me what my new graphics card could do. I was impressed beyond my wildest imagination. The game ran smooth at a resolution of 1680x1050. I am a touch disappointed with the leveling system in this game, but I'm happy to say that once I mastered it, I did a good job making a strong character. Unfortunately, this led to me being obsessed with my skills as I played. I'd make it a point to run about doing some slashing with a sword when my secondary was blades, just to get my strength to the x5 multiplier when I leveled. I eventually made a sorceress that could level an entire room of enemies with a single fireball, or cripple them to the point that my summoned monster could flatten them in seconds. It is very fun to build a character in this game, and while it's not as deep as Morrowind, I give it props for the more immersive experience.

6. Mass Effect

Mass Effect is a relatively new game, but has proven itself to me. There are multiple classes to play through this RPG with, and at least three of them are totally unique. The others are hybrids of the previous, but that still provides for a unique experience playing as Commander Shepherd. The game scores big points for allowing your custom character to talk, despite the ability to change their looks. The story is great, and the main character's lines, especially playing as a Renegade, can be very cool. The main quest of Mass Effect is actually pretty short, but the assignments are plentiful. You can level all the way to 60 in this game, and create a very powerful character. Most of it is action-rpg style, but that is just fine. You can pause the combat if you need to, to issue orders to your squad and use your own powers. Combat can be difficult, but that is also fine. It lends a sense of fulfillment and success when you wipe out that huge geth squad and distribute your skill points!

5. World of Warcraft

World of Warcraft sucked up a lot of my time. I think that's because it was designed to. I got conned into spending $15 a month to level a character on the WOW servers, and it was worth every penny. I made a lot of friends, found a lot of good items and generally had fun the entire time I played. The only reason I ever stopped was because I came to a point that I wanted to keep writing for my site, and couldn't guarantee I could make it to raids. MMOs require some regularity on your part to allow you to meet up with your guildmates to take down powerful enemies. I just didn't have it at the time, but I'm sure I'll go back. I started about eight months before the first expansion pack to WoW and had several high level characters. A unique aspect of MMORPG games is that while you're playing, you'll see others using other races or classes and think, damn, I'd love to try that! The world in the game is just so massive that you can play entirely different areas several times through, and raise to level 70 without doing the same quest twice.

4. Diablo 2 and Lord of Destruction

Diablo 2 was a major turning point for me in pc gaming. Back when I first had a gaming rig, I remember having to play this game in directdraw mode. The framerate sucked, and the graphics were terrible. I played on, regardless of these two crippling blows. The loot man, the loot. Diablo 2's random item creation was superb. Better were the rare named artifacts you'd find, and doing boss runs to find these items, while growing more powerful in the process, was a great mechanic. The fact that enemies respawn was actually a benefit to this game, because you could always go run certain areas to find items or gain experience. I sometimes felt like I needed a plan at all times when planning to move on to nightmare and hell modes, but that was good because it helped me to plan my characters, and feel more attached to them.

3. Baldur's Gate 2 and Throne of Bhaal

Baldur's Gate 2 was a unique experience for me. The graphics weren't great, but the world felt alive. Bioware made this game so chock full of quests you could get lost for well over 100 hours on a single playthrough. I did just that, and loved it! The Dungeons and Dragons style of play made it weird for me, but I loved the simplicity of the weapons and armor in the game. Magical Effects were more prized than they are in most other RPGs. I wasn't overly fond of the almost-required questing to level up, because I would have preferred to be able to play sometimes just roaming the world, still the story was great and it kept me excited. You could of course run into random battles to find loot by moving around a bit on the world map.

2. Fallout 3

Fallout 3 has already cemented itself as a great RPG that will stand the test of time for me. I've already played it through multiple times, and still have little ideas I'd like to try that keep the game alive for me. The character customization options are extreme, and the multitude of options to complete the dozens of quests in the game lend it this massive replayability. Bethesda scores bonus points for making this game so console friendly, thus accessible to the masses.

The game features beautiful views of a postapocalyptic wasteland and an awesome physics engine that makes the graphics in combat superb. Bodies get blown about by explosions, and heads roll with a velocity that seems just right, and bounce along the ground before coming to a rest. The game can be played a bit like a shooter, and with VATS (the ability to pause combat and target enemies) it gives RPG gamers just enough slowdown in battle to make it keep its RPG status.

It makes its way onto my top 10 pc RPGs because it takes what was great about Oblivion, and gives it to me with a package that lets me choose how my character develops.

1. Fallout 2

Another top 10 pc rpg you'd see on many people's lists, Fallout 2 has been around for over a decade now, and has been played by millions. This is one of the best RPGs of all time, even when consoles are brought into consideration. The game was much more open-ended than Baldur's Gate, yet still had that charm. The music was great, driving the postapocalyptic atmosphere the developers designed. Characters are completely classless in this game, and can be customized as you level. There was no level cap, but there was a time limit. The mods for this game gave it that extra lift, you could of course remove the time limit and turn the game into a completely open-ended strategy rpg where you just create characters. At the time, the game was cutting edge and for being the grandfather to many of the PC's best rpgs, it deserves its place as my favorite.